Bombay Art Gallery

Photography first made its inroads into India as early as the 1840s. With this technology, representational accuracy could be ascertained for the first time.

Then British Govt in  India laid great emphasis on this development, as a method of documentation and precise determination.

Landscapes, Archeological sites, Durbars, Princes, Ethnic Tribes and all came under the lens, photographed, documented and preserved for posterity.

Not only the Colonial Masters but Princes and common people became amateur and professional photographers. It was the "great innovation" of the 19th century.

Its effects touched Fine Art, Empire Building, humanities and cultural understanding. Distances started coming closer and realism came to be the order.

Samuel Bourne, Macfarlane, Edmund David Lyon, William Henry Pigou became the new pioneers of Indian Photography.

Even Indian Princes such as Ram Singh of Jaipur became Amateur Photographers, while the Nizam and Udaipur had their own private photography studios.

Raja Deen Dayal, became a Legend in Indian Photography, starting with his studios in Secundrabad and Indore.

Taking the challenge photography placed in front of fine artists, they took to coloring portraits and landscape photographs blending the traditional with the modern.

With the coming of Digital Photography, the traditional forms have been phased out and they have moved to the realm of art and collectibles.

Major Museums all over the world are now collecting period photography.